Shifting Gears

Chapter 16

The first full weekend of August comes too fast for Nora’s liking.

It kicks off with something that Dani calls a corn roast. The name is fairly self-explanatory—people gather in Dani’s backyard, corn is roasted and presumably eaten—but what Nora didn’t expect is the scale of the endeavour. It’s comparable in size to the Canada Day celebrations. People set up lawn chairs and haul in picnic tables borrowed from the park, but there’s less of a family atmosphere. It’s adults-only this time, and it’s suitably more raucous.

“How exactly do I access the edible part?” Nora asks, several drinks deep when Sarah hands her a plate with a burger and an un-shucked ear of charred corn. Having only ever eaten it after it’s been removed from both the husk and the cob, she’s not sure how to handle it.

Dani elbows her way past Sarah to perch on Nora’s picnic table. Her seat dislodges Ryan’s cup, but she ignores his noise of disapproval.

“I’ll show you,” Dani says, picking up the still-steaming piece of corn and pulling the husk back with her bare fingers.

“How do you do that without gloves?”

Dani finishes peeling, impaling each end with a skewer. The skewer handles are shaped like little yellow corncobs.

“I’ve handled hotter things.” Dani says it with a wink, and Nora laughs despite herself.

Sarah makes a disgruntled noise. “Keep it in your pants, Dani.”

“Tired of my corny jokes?” Dani says, grinning like a fool as she holds up the ear of corn. Nora rolls her eyes so hard, she’s surprised they don’t leave her head entirely.

Dani looks delighted.

Once dusk falls, Sarah and Dani set up a bonfire. The party shifts into a lower gear—s’mores and hot dogs are roasted, the moonshine is broken out, Nora curls happily into Dani’s side, and Owen serenades everyone gathered around the fire in Muskoka chairs with a guitar and a low, soothing baritone.

Dani sings along to some of the songs, too. Her voice is soft and sweet. Nora can feel the vibration of it when she rests her head on Dani’s shoulder. Along with the drinks and crackle of the fire, it’s almost enough to lull her into a very pleasant doze until Nora frowns at yet another person heading into Dani’s house to use the washroom.

“A lot of people have been going in and out. Don’t you worry about people breaking your things?”

Dani looks puzzled. “If they didn’t break anything the last few years, I doubt they will now.”

“You host this every year?”

“We used to do it out in the woods near the old CromTech warehouse,” Ryan says, his mouth full of buttery corn. He’s had a few Solo cups too many, and his cheeks are ruddy with it. “There’s an old quarry out there where we used to party. But not anymore. Fuck CromTech.”

Several other people around the fire cheer at Ryan’s curse.

The sudden and unfavourable reminder makes Nora feel like the two ears of corn she just ate might make a reappearance.

“Not fans, I take it?” Nora says tightly, trying to swallow down the nausea.

Ryan scoffs. “Are you kidding? My dad lost his pension when they closed all the plants. We struggled my whole life thanks to them.”

“They’ve been turning around lately, I think,” Naomi says. She’s stretched out in a chair on the other side of the fire while Sarah shucks an ear of corn for her. “They’ve got the most reliable medical imaging tech on the market, with lower prices than the competitors.”

Nora can only be grateful that Naomi either doesn’t remember the conversation they had at Pride or hasn’t made the connection. Either way, Ryan seems less than impressed.

“Big fuckin’ whoop,” Ryan mutters. “Doesn’t change what they did.”

“They didn’t even have the decency to not leave all their shit behind to rust when they closed everything down,” Owen says, strumming his guitar tunelessly. “We stopped doing the corn roast down there after a big fire in ’08. All the fuel they left rotting in the tanks at the manufacturing plant blew up. Bunch of the forest burnt down.”

Nora’s stomach churns even harder. She’d known her father had shut things down here quickly, but she’d had no idea he’d done it so irresponsibly, to the point of causing a disaster that the locals would remember even years later. “Oh my God. Was—was anyone hurt?”

“No,” Dani says quickly. “The fire department put it out pretty quick, everyone was fine.”

“Everyone except the trees and the animals and the soil that got fuel all in it. Fuck ’em!” Ryan shouts, gesturing with his gnawed corncob. “It could have gotten people hurt! Pure greed and laziness is what it was. They should have cleaned it up!”

Equally full of food and alcohol, everyone else raises their voices to match.

“It was a shit thing for them to do back then, but it was forever ago. I never saw the point in holding old grudges,” Dani says.

Dani is only one voice among the many, though, most of which sit on Ryan’s side of the argument, and Nora sinks lower in her chair even as the party picks back up. Ryan and Mila get into a competition over who can sing along to Owen’s music the loudest, and soon a karaoke machine is dragged out from Dani’s living room.

Nora wishes she could disappear.

In the growing chaos, Dani grabs Nora’s hand and tugs it, tipping her head in the direction of the woods at the edge of the property, and they quietly slip away from the hubbub of the fire and into the night.

“Things were starting to get a little loud,” Dani says once the heat of the bonfire and the noise of the partiers gets less pronounced. “Sorry about that. Ryan especially. He can get a bit heated.”

Nora’s face feels suddenly cold with the loss of the flames. She sidles closer to Dani, squeezing her hand tighter as they walk.

“It’s nice to get a break from the noise,” Nora says a little absently.

Ryan’s contempt is sticking with her—she’d known from her first few weeks here that dislike for her company runs deep, but in spending so much time with these people this summer, she’d been able to conveniently forget it. Maybe she’d convinced herself that now that they know her, it wouldn’t be such a big deal. But now her knowledge is cemented: Ryan wouldn’t forgive her if he knew her connection to CromTech. She wonders if anyone else would hate her, too—Sarah, Mila, Owen and Naomi.

Dani.

“You okay?” Dani says quietly.

Nora bites the inside of her cheek. “I don’t feel great. Too much to drink, I think.”

In reality, Nora feels pretty sober, but her thoughts are out of control.

How could she not have known that CromTech left hazardous materials behind when they pulled out of Bracken County? Had her father hidden it, or was it just deemed not important enough to include in any reports? And if Nora had found the information, would she even have done anything about it if it didn’t interfere with her development plans? Would the guilt she’s feeling now have manifested before she knew these people enough to care?

Is Nora no better than her father was? Isn’t she worse ?

Dani squeezes her hand. Her voice gets soft and careful. “Of course. Do you want to go lie down? I can tell everyone to clear out so you can sleep.”

“No, don’t be silly. But Dani,” Nora says, tripping over the truth that wants to spill yet again. Keeping her identity from Dani all these months used to feel like a necessity, but it feels now like a massive breach of trust. The guilt of it sits heavy in her stomach most nights, and tonight it’s worse than ever. “What Ryan said, about CromTech. He’s right. And I think—”

Dani halts suddenly, pulling Nora’s arm taut and stopping her in her tracks. Her head tilts. “Did you hear that?”

“What? I don’t hear anything,” Nora says. The interruption has taken the wind out of her sails somewhat. “Probably a rabbit or something.”

Dani frowns. “Listen.”

With a deep sigh, Nora does. She tries to listen over her racing thoughts, over the anxious beating of her own heart, and it turns out that there is something beyond the sound of crickets or the party in the distance. It sounds, actually, like the rustling of clothing. Breathy sighs. After a few moments of listening, a quiet moan punctuates it, followed by a hushed voice.

“Shh, someone could hear…”

“Everyone’s at the party, Sarah,” comes another voice, louder but clearly distracted. “Nobody’s listening.”

“Sarah?!” Dani says loudly, stepping away from Nora. But she doesn’t sound alarmed or horrified. She sounds delighted.

Sarah, on the other hand, does not.

“Fuck!” Nora can hear Sarah muttering, along with the frantic rustle of clothes being done up. “Dani! What are you doing out here?”

“Oh my gosh, you horn-dog! ” Dani says, louder than ever and now making her way toward the source of the voices. “I knew you were lying when you said you stayed at Mila’s place the other night. Who are you with?”

The second voice laughs, clearly much calmer about the whole situation than Sarah is. “That’s what you told her?”

“I panicked!” Sarah hisses, and now Nora can see the two figures Dani is striding toward—Sarah is finishing with the buttons on her shirt. Next to her, leaning against a tree and fully clothed but pleasantly ruffled, is Naomi.

“We were having a perfectly nice time before you crashed our party,” Naomi says, her kind smile offsetting the sarcasm in her voice.

Dani laughs, crossing her arms and looking pointedly at her cousin. “These are my woods, too, you know. When were you planning on telling me you’re finally seeing each other?”

Sarah, who seems to be doing everything she can to hide behind Naomi, sighs and leans her forehead onto Naomi’s shoulder. “I was going to tell you, I swear. I just…”

“Chickened out?” Nora supplies unhelpfully. “Seems to be a family trait.”

Sarah lifts her head to glare through the darkness. “We were trying to keep it low-key. Just for a while. You know what this town is like with gossip.”

“Intimately,” Nora says wryly.

Dani spreads her arms wide, pulling Naomi and Sarah both into a hug that Sarah seems desperate to get out of. “I’m so happy for you guys! I’ve been telling Sarah to ask you out for ages.”

Naomi laughs gently when Dani lets them both go, reaching out to stroke Sarah’s short hair. “You know, I actually made the first move in the end.”

“Me, too!” Nora says. “What is it with Coopers and stalling out at the finish line?”

Naomi offers her a high-five, laughing, while Dani and Sarah trip over each other’s words trying to argue the point.

The distraction isn’t enough to quiet Nora’s mind for the night. Dani’s bedroom is one area of the house still closed to the public, and, inside it, Nora is helpless against the thoughts that still press in at the edges: CromTech’s mistakes, the project outline sitting on her hard drive, the vitriol in Ryan’s voice, everyone’s easy agreement in hating the company Nora has worked so hard to run. The conversation she had with Dani under the tree house, about how development would affect the area.

Nora stays up long into the night after Dani has fallen asleep, typing frenetic notes into her phone until the battery finally gives out in the morning’s early hours. New ideas that could use her eco-tech prototypes to benefit Riverwalk pile up faster than she can write them down, but none solve her problem completely. None would provide the funding she came here for.

Funding or not, though, the knowledge that Nora has been avoiding for weeks has solidified in the wake of last night.

Her original proposal stopped being viable a long time ago.

* * *

The notes stay untouched in Nora’s phone for a while. She fully intends on sitting down to find a way to fold them into her proposal—she tries several times to set aside afternoons meant to sort out all the tangled ideas she jotted down. But as the last few weeks of August slip away and their time together dwindles, Dani seems intent on not letting Nora spend her time working.

Dani takes more and more days off at the shop, which Nora is sure Sarah is less than thrilled about. She hardly ever sleeps at her own place throughout the whole month, staying with Nora instead, and Nora ensures that her needs and wants are met within the walls of the rental house or when they venture into town together. Whenever Dani wakes up to find Nora working away on her laptop, she single-mindedly finds new ways of distracting her until the proposal is the last thing on her mind.

The distractions aren’t only of Dani’s making, though.

Nora had almost forgotten about the package she ordered two weeks ago until it arrives in the hands of the very person it’s meant for. It arrives closer to the end of the summer than she’d like, meaning there’s less time to use it to its fullest potential, but Nora still intends on doing her best.

Dani knocks on her door with a coffee in one hand and a small box in the other, and she offers both to Nora.

“This was on your doorstep,” Dani says as she steps inside, wiggling her boots off by the heel and leaving them at the door as she’s done a hundred times. “Order anything exciting?”

Nora can tell by the package’s weight that it’s exactly what she thinks it is, and her excitement mounts as Dani opens the fridge and grabs the jug of iced tea. Nora’s fingers itch to open the flimsy cardboard. “I was actually hoping that you’d be here when it arrived.”

Dani looks at Nora quizzically over the rim of her glass. “Me? Why?”

“It’s sort of a gift for both of us.”

Dani looks intrigued, pulling her keys out of her pocket and selecting the sharpest one. “Well, let’s open ’er up!”

When Dani pulls the contents out of the box, ripping off the encasing plastic, there’s a moment of pointed silence before she starts laughing.

Nora can admit that the sizable strap-on she bought does look a bit silly in Dani’s hands with its leather harness dangling toward the floor. But Nora is fairly sure that, given a few minutes and some visual stimulation, Dani won’t be laughing for long.

“Sorry, I just—I wasn’t expecting that. You bought us a strap?” Dani says, still chuckling. “I have one, remember?”

Nora smiles, moving closer to Dani and reaching out. Her slightly smaller hand wraps around the thickest part of the toy just under Dani’s, and she squeezes. The expensive material gives slightly under her palm.

Dani swallows hard, her laughter forgotten.

“I told you I wanted a bigger one,” Nora says, her voice intentionally low. She’s gratified by the way Dani’s eyes widen dramatically. “And this one comes with a special feature. Look.” Nora twists the toy to show off the base, which is the real reason that she purchased this model.

As a part of the design, it’s shaped into a soft silicone cushion of sorts—rather than being flat, it’s carefully curved, perfectly shaped with ridges to fit snugly against the giver’s clit behind the O-ring of the harness. “For you to grind against.”

Dani blinks rapidly. Nora can see the picture of exactly what’s being suggested form behind her eyes.

“Really?” Dani says, leaning closer for inspection. She looks a bit doubtful, but Nora suspects that if she can get the damn thing strapped on, it’s going to change Dani’s life.

“I thought it might work for you,” Nora says simply.

Dani’s eyes track up the length, focusing on Nora’s fingers and how they only just close around the circumference near the base. She bites at her lip. And she grins.

It’s not long before Nora is naked with Dani above her, the harness firmly buckled to Dani’s hips. The slight nervousness Dani had shown while putting the thing on has melted away. She’s kissing Nora with her usual enthusiasm, seemingly having forgotten about the newness of the toy until Nora reaches down to wrap her fist around it.

Dani shifts her hips slightly, aligning them more with Nora’s, and Nora uses the movement to press the toy—and the cushion—more firmly into place.

Dani’s reaction is visceral. She makes a loud, guttural noise as it presses into her. Her hips buck hard into Nora’s hand, and her kisses trail off into panting.

“Holy crap,” Dani gasps, staring down between their bodies at where Nora’s hand still grasps the length.

Nora squeezes, and Dani’s belly twitches as if she can feel it through the silicone.

“What do you think?” Nora asks, pressing it up again.

Dani moans, her eyes fluttering closed for a moment. She’s holding herself up on her elbows—Nora can feel her arms trembling.

“It’s, uh,” Dani says breathlessly, still twitching in Nora’s firm grip, “it’s… wow .”

“Good experiment?”

“Makes me appreciate the scientific method,” Dani mumbles, kissing Nora deep and a little bit rough before pulling back just barely. “What’s the next step? Analyze the data?”

Nora smiles against her mouth. Spreading her legs to brace against the sheets, Nora slides a hand to rest on Dani’s lower back. When Dani looks down to watch the strap settle between Nora’s legs, she presses her hand down.

“The next step is,” Nora whispers shakily, bucking into the toy as it drags against her clit, “I want you inside me.”

Dani whimpers. The move puts almost as much pressure against her, and the muscles of her back shift under Nora’s hand.

“Okay,” Dani breathes, nodding rapidly. “Okay. Yeah. Right. Okay.”

The confident air Dani usually has in bed is shaken by the introduction of her own pleasure, but in this case, Nora is perfectly happy to help out. Rather than pushing the toy against Dani again, she pulls, guiding the tip downward.

Though Nora is expecting it, the sensation of the head nudging her is enough to make her heart skip. It’s thicker than anything she’s taken in a long time, and the knowledge of the stretch it’s going to give her makes her feel a little bit wild.

“Go slow,” Nora whispers, digging her nails into Dani’s lower back to urge her forward.

Dani nods. Her forehead is already shiny with sweat.

The first inch sinking inside her already has Nora gasping. And, God , slow Dani goes. She eases Nora open so carefully, with so much reverence, guiding herself with a hand on the base of the toy and pressing their foreheads together as Nora clings to her back.

Nora’s control of the situation is slipping through her fingers. She’s tied up in knots as Dani’s hands roam her body, desperate for that pressure and fullness and just a hint of pain. The look on Dani’s face as she slowly takes her ignites something deep.

It feels like an eternity before Dani bottoms out. Their hips align completely, and Nora has a sudden moment of terrifying clarity.

She’s never felt so close to someone in her entire life.

Nora is no stranger to sex, with strap-ons or otherwise. She’s always had decent results with this sort of toy. But Dani’s reaction is above and beyond what Nora expected. Dani is trembling above her, one hand anchored at the crease of Nora’s thigh to make more space for herself, pressed against Nora’s body from chest to thighs. She’s unmoving, waiting for Nora to adjust, but Nora can feel the tension in every muscle. The control. The desire. It’s as if the toy is an extension of her.

With her legs bracketed around Dani’s hips, with her heavy breaths mingling with Dani’s, with what feels like every inch of her filled to the brim, the combination of vulnerability and safety that sweeps over Nora is almost too much to take.

When Nora gathers herself enough to shift her hips upward, Dani seems to finally feel the impact of the cushion pressing into her again. Her hips buck forward hard with another broken moan, and the movement inside Nora firmly displaces any thoughts that might have been in her head that aren’t please fuck me until I can’t walk .

Nora bites gently on Dani’s earlobe, pressing herself up and into the strap—and, by extension, into Dani—with five words that make Dani go wild.

“I’m ready. Don’t hold back.”

With what Nora can only describe as a grunt , Dani plunges into Nora with a few uneven thrusts, each one punctuated with a shaky whine as she gets used to the sensation of the cushion. She pauses after the fourth, pressing deep and firm in a way that makes them both whimper, their eyes closed and foreheads touching.

When Dani’s eyes next open, the raw hunger in them engulfs Nora completely.

Dani takes hold of Nora’s thighs, braces her knees against the mattress, and uses what feels like most of her core strength to thrust into Nora hard . The impact of the sudden jump in pace is exquisite. The angle, the little groan Dani lets out at the pressure. The slight loss of control.

“Fuck!” Nora gasps, her hands shooting up to clench around the narrow slats of the headboard. “Holy shit, Dani—”

“Sorry. Is that okay?” Dani is panting, her eyes a bit unfocused. Her hips stop moving, but Nora arches up, desperate for more.

“Yes. God, do it again.”

Dani obeys. Her pace picks up even more when she realizes that Nora likes it, that she can take the roughness, and what follow are probably the most sublime prolonged moments of Nora’s life.

Nora’s hand digs into Dani’s lower back, but Dani doesn’t need the direction. It’s as if this has unleashed a brand-new side of her, and that new side has peeled open a layer of Nora’s desire that she’s always kept tightly under wraps. A desperate, needy, vulnerable layer.

Dani moves into her hard and fast, unselfconsciously carried by the current of her own newfound pleasure, and Nora lets it carry her away. The combination of the thick toy inside her, Dani’s surprised, overwhelmed noises, and the unrelenting pace Dani sets is bringing them both closer to the edge by the second.

“Nora,” Dani gasps, hiking Nora’s legs up, quickening her rhythm into short, fierce thrusts that somehow feel even better. “Feels so—feels so good .” There’s confusion with Dani’s desire, like she can’t quite understand how this feels so good, but she’s chasing that feeling to the end.

And the end is close. Nora can hear it in Dani’s choppy breathing, can feel it in her quivering muscles and the thrumming pulse at her throat. And Nora can feel it in her own body, a tightening and tensing—a right there , an almost.

“That’s it,” Nora gasps, her free hand gripping firmly at the back of Dani’s neck. She pants into Dani’s hair, her hips moving with Dani’s in a push and pull that feels primal. Animal instinct. Legs up, toes curling over Dani’s back, taking every thrust with pure, undiluted need. “Let go with me. God, yes, I’ve got you, fuck —”

With a noise Nora has never heard her make before Dani breaks, her hips twitching wildly as she comes hard against the toy and into Nora.

More than anything that came before, that’s what pushes Nora over. It’s not even about the physical sensations—it’s the concept of what’s happening. The deeper, cerebral connection that loops in the rest of her senses. The knowledge that Dani is coming while she fucks her. Dani’s muscles seizing under her hands. The sound of her surprised, instinctive gasps. The taste of her, the scent—simple, just shampoo and light deodorant and whatever base body chemistry makes her so enticing.

It all swirls inside Nora, releases the tension in the core of her, and implodes.

When it finally tapers off, Dani is still inside her, and she’s trembling all over. Her face is buried in the crook of Nora’s neck. She’s breathing like she’s run a marathon, winded to a level Nora hasn’t seen before. When Nora shifts, every place their bodies press together is slick with sweat.

“Hey,” Nora says, her voice raspy from noises she doesn’t fully remember making. She rubs circles on Dani’s back, pressing trembling kisses to her shoulder. “Are you all right?”

Dani raises her head. Her hair is in disarray, damp at her hairline and tousled in the back where Nora tangled her fingers. Nora is relieved to see that rather than looking upset, Dani’s eyes are bright and alert. In fact, she looks like she wants nothing more than to devour Nora again.

Nora clenches involuntarily around the length still inside her.

“That was fucking incredible ,” Dani says, her voice a low rumble. She shifts in a way that jostles the strap-on just enough to make Nora’s breath catch.

“Oh,” Nora says inelegantly. Dani is starting to move again, a slow, mindless rolling motion that makes Nora wrap a leg around Dani’s hips in wordless encouragement. “Good. I’m…I’m glad.” Her voice breaks on the last word.

Dani presses in deeper, her smile getting brighter with every gentle thrust. “Can we do that again?”

The air leaves Nora’s lungs in a breathy laugh. She nods enthusiastically, wrapping her arms around Dani’s shoulders and pulling her in for a kiss. “If you think you can handle it.”

Dani’s answer is to flip them both smoothly until Nora is on top, grab the softest part of her hips, and brace her feet on the mattress to thrust up into her.

Nora muffles her groan of approval into Dani’s shoulder. It hadn’t taken Dani long to discover just how much her strength turns Nora on, that she likes to be thrown around a little, and she’s used that knowledge mercilessly since.

“I can handle it,” Dani says, her voice stronger than it’s been since Nora buckled her into the harness. Her hands slide up to Nora’s waist, fitting perfectly into the dip there as Nora sits up to straddle her properly. “Can you?”

Nora lets go of her inhibitions completely. There’s no hiding anything at this angle. Dani has a clear view of the flush that covers Nora’s chest. She can see the way Nora rocks down into her, greedily asking for more even after she’s been sated, the slick wetness Nora has left all over the leather harness. Dani’s eyes fixate on where they’re joined, where Nora is spread wide around the toy that links them.

“Fuck. I can feel you,” Dani says, her voice rising into a whine as she rocks upward. Her belly flexes with the effort, and Nora finally indulges her long-held impulse to press a hand against the softness there as she braces herself on Dani’s body.

Nora has no time to be self-conscious. Dani’s desire is written all over her face. She seems to have a well of energy that never runs dry, experimenting with movements and positions and finding all the shiny new corners of her own pleasure until Nora is sure their limit must be approaching.

By the end, Nora is on her back again, the pace slowing gradually to match her energy, and it’s shockingly easy to embrace what she’s been hurtling headfirst toward all summer.

Dani is patient now. Gentle. It’s veering further from sex and closer to what Nora might define as something more, and the closeness teeters on the edge of overwhelming.

Nora’s legs are wrapped around Dani’s hips tightly enough to limit motion, but the steady rocking of their bodies is still enough. Her hands cling to Dani’s mid-back while Dani is gripping at Nora’s thighs. Dani presses their foreheads together, trading slow kisses and murmured words of affection until they’re breathing the same air.

Even at a pace that doesn’t usually work for Nora, Dani coaxes her into a deep, subterranean orgasm that seems to rumble up from the absolute tips of her toes. Dani follows her soon after with a small, broken cry, and it feels like she’s cracked Nora’s chest open to put her heart on blatant, uncomfortable display. Like those grey eyes could see into the core of her.

Nora is grateful that Dani collapses on top of her without interrogating why Nora has to wipe her eyes.

For long, quiet minutes, she holds Dani inside her, enjoying the connection of it, pressing gentle kisses across her neck and shoulder. Dani only moves when Nora starts to shiver against the cold air on her damp skin. She’s reluctant to let Dani go for even the short time it takes for her to wriggle out of the harness and curl herself around Nora’s back, wrapping her arms around Nora’s middle. The sudden emptiness inside Nora is jarring, but her hip sockets pop satisfyingly as she stretches out.

“I have never, ever , felt like that before,” Dani whispers.

Nora isn’t sure she can talk right now without it coming out garbled and shaky, so instead she pulls Dani’s hands up to pepper them with soft kisses.

“I know this is a weird thing to be grateful for, but…thank you. Seriously,” Dani says. She pulls her hand away to fidget with Nora’s earring, running her finger over the diamond stud like it’s a worry stone. It’s strangely comforting. “I’ve never been with someone who cared so much about how I—about how my body—I mean, about making me feel good. You know?”

Nora can feel the heat of Dani’s blush where her face is tucked into the curve of Nora’s neck. It’s almost funny. Of all the things they’ve done over the course of the evening, this is what has Dani embarrassed.

“I’m just glad I could find something that worked for you. And I can’t say it didn’t work out incredibly well for me, too,” Nora says, gesturing at the absolute disaster her bed has become. Three of four pillows are on the floor, the duvet is twisted somewhere near their feet, and the fitted sheet has lost its grip on the mattress.

“Has it ever been like this for you?” Dani whispers into the quiet after they’ve both settled. She fits against Nora’s back like a perfect puzzle piece. There’s a shade of vulnerability in her voice that can’t be ignored. “Am I just like—a total sap who’s never had good sex before?”

Nora swallows. Dani is breathing softly into Nora’s hair, their hands and legs intertwined. It feels like all the pretense between them is gone now, and she can’t bring herself to be anything but honest.

“No. It’s never been like this for me.” Nora takes a breath. “This was amazing.”

Dani’s body relaxes against her. “Okay. That makes me feel like less of a loser.”

“You’re not a loser just because nobody has ever taken the time to accommodate you,” Nora says. Her attempt to look over her shoulder at Dani is foiled by Dani burying her face deeper into Nora’s hair.

“Why did you?” Dani asks. The words are muffled.

“Why did I what?”

“Take the time.”

It should be a simple question. The easy answer is that she wanted to make Dani feel good, but Dani has been steadily reassuring her all summer that she’s already been doing so. This was Nora going for extra credit.

The other answers are harder to admit.

“Nobody has ever taken much time to accommodate me either,” Nora says simply. “Nobody besides you. You deserve to be accommodated.”

Dani finally emerges from her safe place between Nora’s shoulders to press a kiss to Nora’s cheek. “You’re a good person.”

The tenderness of the moment is eclipsed by a tidal wave of crushing guilt, followed by a terrible, absurd desire to tell Dani everything. Because, contrary to Dani’s belief in her, Nora isn’t a good person. Quite the opposite. The fact that she’s somehow duped Dani into thinking so is unexpected, and it brings to bear the aspect of Nora’s trip that she’s spent so long avoiding.

Nora hasn’t been lying so far, per se. In fact, she’s been carefully avoiding doing so. She’s just not telling anyone the whole story, which has begun to feel somehow worse. Dani’s faith in her is a new element that doubles the weight of Nora’s whole summer of half-truths, and it brings to light the third reason that she’s become so fixated on making sure Dani is fulfilled.

To make up for everything else.

Nora chokes out a short laugh. “You wouldn’t say that if you knew me better.”

“Then let me know you better.”

Dani leaves room for Nora to brush it off, but Nora’s heart pounds harder even than it did a few minutes ago.

Some small part of her resists the idea of sharing. There’s always been a safety to not being known. But a larger part, the part Dani opened tonight, wants the opposite.

All it takes is a gentle encouragement for Nora to spill her entire childhood on the sheets.

She tells Dani about her father, about his distance and his cold anger. How she worked her entire life to earn his praise and never succeeded. She tells Dani about her never-ending line of stepmothers, each with their own ideas about who Eleanor Cromwell should be, and the inconsistency it gave her childhood.

Dani absorbs it all. She catches Nora like a safety net as she spirals through her years of isolation and loneliness, and how she turned to knowledge as a comfort. Achievement and constant work. How it all instilled in her a bone-deep sense of not good enough , one that she can’t escape no matter how many all-nighters she pulls doing a job she never wanted.

She even tells Dani what she’s never quite admitted to herself—that no matter how much she treasures Kayla and Ash, she’s never been able to open up to them the way they have to her. She doesn’t understand why they care about her, and she often pushes them away just so they can’t hurt her first.

It’s all easier to say when they aren’t lying face to face. By the end of it, Nora is crying, but she feels lighter than she has in years. The weight of an adolescence she’s always refused to share has been lifted from her shoulders, and Dani isn’t judging or trying to fix anything. She’s just listening.

Dani holds her, spooning herself against Nora’s back in a tight and soothing position. She lets Nora calm down in comfortable quiet so she can sort out her feelings in isolation the way she’s used to without needing to actually be alone.

Dani’s perfect. She’s so much more than Nora deserves.

After a long silence, caught up in the tangled, messy web of truth telling, Nora stumbles out of the past and into the present.

“Dani, I haven’t been totally honest with you.” Nora’s in unknown territory, driving through a blizzard with zero visibility and just hoping the road is still beneath the tires. “There’s something I need to tell you. I’ve needed to tell you for a long time. Even if you hate me for it, I need you to know.”

Dani makes a quiet noise behind her, her face still pressed between Nora’s shoulders.

Nora steadies herself and steps off the cliff. “This summer is more than a vacation. I was here on a work trip, for my company. For…CromTech. I’m the CEO of CromTech.”

Dani says nothing.

“I know I should have told you. It started as me not wanting to mess up my project, but then it snowballed the more we got close and—and by the time things progressed, I didn’t want to lose you by telling you the whole truth,” Nora says. The hand that isn’t clinging to Dani’s arm is clenched into itself in a tight fist. Her voice is weak, but she pushes on. “CromTech’s investors have been on me about financing all my sustainable-tech pitches. So I presented the county as an easy development venture to fund our research.”

Still Dani says nothing. Nora can’t bring herself to turn over to look at her, to see the disappointment she’s sure is etched into Dani’s face.

“My original proposal was to buy up as much property as we could and push for tourism to spike value. Make it a resort town and then sell it all. But I changed my mind, I—I can’t do that now. I’ve been thinking of other solutions.”

Nora’s breath is coming so quickly that she’s sure she must be close to hyperventilation. She focuses on her breaths, letting the finality of her confession wash over her as Dani’s silence stretches on.

“I didn’t expect it to be like this. I didn’t want to get close to anyone, I just wanted to…” Nora’s voice falters. There’s a hollow ache in her chest as it all spills out of her. Her breath hitches on a fresh wave of tears. “I was just looking for the best way to profit. I’m sorry.”

Nora waits for the hammer to fall. She waits for Dani to do something—to speak, to get angry, to get up and leave. For the unearned bubble of half-truths Nora has been living in to finally pop. But Dani is unmoving.

In the quiet of the dark bedroom, Nora hears a soft snore.

Like a balloon popping under a descending foot, all the energy goes out of Nora at once. It’s partly disappointment, knowing that she’s going to have to muster up the courage to tell Dani the truth at some other time, but there’s also no small amount of relief—the idea of Dani hating her is terrifying, even in its inevitability. Nora has barely two weeks left here, and now that she’s truly facing down the reality of not having Dani in her life anymore, it feels worse than she ever imagined.

She doesn’t know if she has the strength to do this again.

As Dani pulls her closer with a sleepy grunt, enveloping her in a sense of safety even now, a thought comes to Nora. One that’s as terrifying as it is exhilarating. It drifts across her mind like a rubber duck bobbing on the river, gentle but undeniable.

I think I’m in love with you.